


Before Dawn

by paeryn



Category: Young Avengers
Genre: F/M, M/M, Minor Violence, Other, wheel of time AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-16
Updated: 2013-10-16
Packaged: 2017-12-29 15:26:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1007019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paeryn/pseuds/paeryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The classic lineup of our team, reimagined for a different world.  The Last Battle is won, but many of the Dark One’s creatures still remain in the world. Several years after Tarmon Gai’don, their small free company is called to join the fray in the great Darkwood against a large amassing of Trollocs.  They discover an abandoned inn not far from their rendez-vous point, and decide to stay there for the night.  Things get a tad weird from there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place in the Wheel of Time AU, a few decades after the last book in the series ( _A Memory of Light _). As such, some of the terminology of that book series is used without great explanation. I had more fun writing this one than expected. I’d love to revisit this AU in the future, as there are a _ton_ more adventures to follow this one.__

**A** wind blew from the Aryth Ocean towards the port city of Bandar Eban. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time, but it was a beginning. Rain followed the billowing gusts through the city streets, and lightning followed in its wake as tiles and shingles clattered to the streets. Street merchants rushed to protect their wares, and travelers sought the comfort of the nearest inn. The wind drove inland, bringing its storms and leaving wreckage in its wake alongside the stench of ozone. It crashed against the Mountains of Mist, their craggy peaks turning the wind’s direction southward towards the great Darkwood, called by some the Paerish Swar. There it lingered but a moment, and was gone. 

The rain had faded to a dull pounding on the patched roof of the abandoned inn they’d found the night before. The wind slammed the shutters against the side of their windows in a petulant last gust before dying off. The violent storms occurred much more rarely after the battle at Shayol Ghul, but their ferocity was still legendary. They had all traveled far from Tanchico, leaving that still-rudderless city to meet with the main force of _Chia Faile_ and the Lion Guard as they headed into the morass that was the Paerish Swar. They’d hope to meet up with both forces at the Travelling ground about a league ahead, but daylight had passed more quickly than they anticipated and night had fallen.

Staring out into the not-so-distant forest from the inn’s once welcoming porch, Elijan Braden Khirgan ignored the water as it spread in rivulets about his freshly shorn head. He was proud of both his Seanchan and Ebou Dari heritage, though many found that hard to take in. At odds since the Forerunner’s return, the two cultures had clashed for years before settling down into an uneven hybrid that was still undergoing significant growing pains. His parents had found each other much later in life, and both were proud of the cultures that had raised them. So it came to no shock for anyone who knew Eli in a meaningful way if he was doubly so. Even when stranded in such a backwater as he found himself this evening, he took the time to make sure his head was shaved smooth and his knives were sharp. 

Unable to sleep from the racket of both Tomas’ snoring and Bili’s moaning heard through the thin, decaying walls, Eli had fetched his sharpening stone and set about getting his weaponry in order. He’d left his spears with Katerine—she was more adept at their use in any event, and had focused on strengthening the edge on both of his swords as well as Kas and Kat’s throwing blades. Perhaps if they were successful in the coming day, they could afford to head across the mountains to Emond’s Field and see about acquiring some Power-wrought blades. They didn’t come cheaply, but they ought to have earned enough between them.

Nataniel walked out and sat next to him on the porch, silently. Eli swore he’d seen the man sleep only a handful of times since he and Katerine had picked him up several weeks back on the way through Cairhien. They’d stopped at the school so she could purchase some books and look up some old friends. Despite the Aybara’s constant travel between the two territories they now ruled, _Chia Faile_ still retained their chapterhouse in Cairhien. Their honor was House Aybara’s, but both Perrin and Faile had given their blessing to have the house continued in both that founding city as well as erecting a new chapterhouse in Camelyn. Apparently House Trakand and the newfound Aybara dynasty had nearly come to blows over that small fact.

Kat had practically grown up at the house in Cairhien, sneaking away from her noble family at any given moment to practice discipline and combat with the sisters. Nataniel was the brother of one of those old friends, enrolled in the school and something of a genius. He’d had to sneak away, ultimately, because too many of the noble houses in that fair city saw his inventions as opportunites for elevation, if not a path to the throne itself. Noble houses that included both those of Katerine and Nataniel. The man was convinced he could make Dragons that could fit in the palm of a man’s hand without taking said hand off—a dangerous claim, even more so if it was true. Eli supposed dawn would answer that question.

“Quiet night,” the scholar said as he gazed out into the darkness that was once the inn’s courtyard.

“It ought to be,” Eli countered. “Noisy enough tomorrow for all of us combined, or so I’d reckon.”

“You’d think, this many years afterwards, that these nests of vermin would be wiped out by now.”

“Between the Aes Sedai and the Asha’man, most of them are,” said Bili, joining them as he scratched his scalp through his unruly mop of black hair and stifled a yawn. A small gesture of fingers on his left hand pushed the rain away in a dome around them, only apparent as the water hit and ran against its surface.

“True,” Nataniel acknowledged, “I think there must be a law that any significant gathering of the creatures have to be in some backwater on the edge of nowhere, where the swarms of bitemes are as much a threat as Shadowspawn.” 

“Even bitemes won’t feed on a Trolloc,” Bili grimly chuckled, never tired of the ridiculousness of Nataniel’s complaints as they ventured farther and farther afield from the city upbringing that had, until recently, sheltered him.

“Without a Myrdraal to direct them, they won’t go near any large settlements anymore. And there are precious little of the Eyeless left.” Eli whistled to himself in satisfaction as he ran his finger along his newly sharpened and polished blade before grabbing his second sword to begin the process anew.

Nataniel watched mirthfully as Bili jumped almost a foot as large, wide tattooed hands reached out from the darkness behind him and wrapped themselves around his waist. The two were a strange pair, to be sure. Despite being of the age as the rest of them, Bili looked almost five years their junior. He’d heard that happened to those who touched the True Source, but not as young as Bili was—at least not among the menfolk. Teo, his Warder, stood in stark contrast to the man he was sworn to protect. Wide shouldered where Bili was slight, dark skinned while Bili was pale, and his personality as engaging as Bili’s tended to be withdrawn. Raised by the Sea Folk after his folks were killed during the Return, he had their grace as well as their love for bodily adornment. Five silver rings adorned his left ear, and despite lacking the webbing of his adopted family, he still bore the family and clan tattoos on his hands. In fact, his arms writhed with markings that, to the Warder, symbolized every significant event in his life.

The relationship between the two had bothered Nataniel at first, if he was being honest with himself. Elijan seemed to accept it out of hand—apparently it was not altogether uncommon among the rank and file of the Seanchan military for two men to find companionship of a sort with each other. Kat and Kas, of course, were equally nonplussed. _Chia Faile_ made no secret that quite a few of their members were pillow friends, a fact that had barred them from several communities had barred their doors to them. They both knew Sisters that had formed lifelong relationships. Tomas seemed to share his unease with the situation, frequently teasing the two about their relationship, oftentimes in company that might not look upon it favorably. 

It was that teasing that had forced him to reconsider his own stance. If someone who truly cared for them, and Tomas had been friends with both for years, gave them so much trouble day in and day out, what must they suffer from strangers? And for what, precisely? He knew too well that the heart chose as it willed, his own withering every time he saw Katerine gaze at Eli when he was unawares. He’d decided that what was between the Asha’man and the Warder was precisely that—between them. And he did enjoy Teo’s sense of humor.

“A restless crew tonight, I see,” said the big man. That was another thing Nataniel liked. Teo’s voice always seemed to hold in laughter, even in the most dire of circumstances.

“Something feels…off,” muttered Bili to no one in particular.

“Shadowspawn?”

“No, not that, just…” Bili trailed off as he touched a two fingers to his temples and rubbed in circles. “I’m sure its nothing.”

“What’s nothing?” asked a tall, raven-haired beauty as she descended the creaking stairs from where the women had slept the night. Dressed in an almost ankle length shift, Katerine still managed to make most of the men turn the heads as she casually leaned against the door frame.

“Bili says something is off,” Teo said as he seemed to scour the night for some invisible threat.

“Off how?” asked Kat, equally as wary.

“If I knew that, I’d say more than ‘something feels off’” snapped Bili before taking a deep breath. “Sorry, Kat. It just feels like…”

“Waiting,” Kat said after a moment.

Bili felt a chill run down his spine.

“That’s it, isn’t it,” asked Teo. “I woke up because I guess I sort of sensed you were uneasy about something, but just like you I couldn’t put my finger on it. To me, it just sort of feels like there’s a storm about to break.”

They all looked out into the clearing that surrounded the inn and the woods beyond. The rain had all but stopped; all that remained was a meager drizzle that seemed to slow by the second.

“Well, fretting about it isn’t going to solve anything,” Kate said cheerfully. “Tomorrow’s the big day, gentlemen. Might I suggest you retire to your rooms and attempt to rest? You’ll want your wits about you, if we’re to deal with the Lions and the Falcons tomorrow—and the Trollocs, of course. I’ll take watch. It’s only a few hours until dawn anyways.”

They all looked at each other, weighing options. It was hard to fight this feeling, as if the forest around them had taken in a breath it was waiting to release. Now that Kat had named it, each of them could feel what Bili had first sensed upon waking. And each could think of absolutely nothing worthwhile to do about it. How do you fight a feeling? 

“Your tired, Bili,” Teo murmured into his Asha’man’s hair. “You haven’t had a good night’s sleep in three days, and you spent most of tonight talking in your sleep. I’m sure you were Dreaming again. You need real rest if you’re going to be any help to anyone tomorrow.”

“You too, Nataniel,” Katerine agreed and threw up her hands to block Nataniel’s glare as he turned again to look at her. “I know, I know, the great Nataniel Cirsai does not need sleep…but I promised your sister I’d take care of you when we smuggled you out of the Dragon’s School, and that’s a promise I intend to keep.”

Nataniel actually had the good nature to blush at the light castigation, and bowed his head in agreement. He stood up and wandered back into the derelict inn, vanishing from sight as he turned into his room. Moments later, Teo untangled himself from Bili and guided him towards their own room at the far left of inn’s center hallway. The bubble keeping what little moisture was still falling from the sky off of the porch silently popped a few minutes later. Kat sat down next to Eli.

“I’m nervous, Kat,” Eli confessed, after sitting in silence for a few more minutes staring out into the night.

“Why?”

“This is our first real outing, this ragtag group we’ve somehow gathered together,” Eli said, voice raised as if to stop the objections he knew were coming. “Outside of that one time, half of them have never fought someone one-on-one, let alone in a real battle. And I don’t mean practicing forms somewhere, or sparring with friends. Who we face—what we face—tomorrow isn’t going to be like anything they’ve seen.”

“They’re ready.”

“How can you know that? Even Teo isn’t sure. You can see it when he thinks no one is looking. His eyes are already sad, Kat, as if he’s already said goodbye to some of us.”

“Well, I think you’re reading too much into things. You’re a brooder. You brood,” Katerine chided, in another attempt at levity. “We’ll be with the Lion Guard of Andor and Aybara’s forces. They’re each bound to have several channelers with them. Aybara will have his Power-wrought weapons. The only reason we were summoned to help was because of what happened in Godan, and we happened to be in Bandor Eban when their gleemen caught wind of the tale.”

Eli grimaced. He’d heard the songs being told of their exploits, and they’d gotten more wrong than right. Still, his band stood out. An Asha’Man bonded to a male Warder, two junior members of _Chia Faile_ , a Seanchan soldier, and of course, the only known male Windfinder the Sea Folk had ever let live. They always saved Tomas for last, in each telling of the tale. His story was tragic as it was triumphant, of course, though Eli would never admit it to the man, and the gleemen took great joy in exaggerating how nimble and graceful the man was as he danced across the battlefield against the field of Sharan invaders, slaying all near him with the One Power with elegant strokes of his hand.

The truth had been altogether different. Tomas had waded into the force while the rest of them were still trying to decide whether to engage them or contact the Tairen military stationed within the city to handle the incursion. Sharan raiders had become a problem after Tarmon Gai'don, appearing via Travelling and swarming out to occupy territory or confiscate goods or slaves before vanishing back into the Gateways from which they had come. Channelers were being taught ways of recognizing the incursions before they opened and sealing or destroying the weave of the Gateway before it opened, but it was an imperfect study. Too many died when Gateways opened sooner than expected, and every loss of a channeler was keenly felt. The war against the Shadow had taken much from them all. 

Tomas had almost died that day, as the rest of them had scrambled to engage the enemy. Bili called down lightning in an attempt to break apart the Sharan battle formation. Meanwhile, Eli and Teo jumped into the fray, attempting to cut their way to Tomas who was using his peculiar link to _saidin_ to speed through the Sharan formation towards their Ayyad commanders before they had a chance to channel as well. Kat and Kas had followed soon after, Kat standing alongside Bili with her bow on a nearby hilltop and Kas guarding her with her knives and chakrams, razor-edged discs that shattered spears and sliced flesh with equal alacrity. The Sharans had made ample use of them during the war, and _Chia Faile_ had seized on their usefulness and made training its sisters in their use a high priority. Eventually, the crowd pushed towards the hilltop, with the three men of their company in their midst.

And then of course, Bili and Tomas had linked. Channeling both Air and Fire, lightning the width of a horse fell from the sky and toppled the Ayyad first, the Sharan command structure shattered at the top. They’d been lucky there were only two. Smaller strikes fell from the heavens seemingly at random, breaking apart the tight formation of the raiding party. Teo and Eli, back to back, made their way to Kas and the three proceeded to push outwards through the invading force around them. A dome of Air fell around the battlefield, preventing the Sharans from leaving or Travelling home. But a shield that large was a great strain for Bili, even linked. The barrage of lightning ceased, and instead Kat saw to it that a rain of arrows replaced the fire that had rained down upon their enemies. 

One by one, the raiders fell to steel and arrow, trapped in a barrel with a force that had never fought together before, that barely knew each other. And yet they stood their ground until the Tairen military finally did arrive. The captain found the survivors had already surrendered, kneeling on the ground and their weapons consolidated in a pile at the top of the hill. A final lightning strike turned them into slag, liquid steel and copper running like rivers down the drumlin’s face to pool in front of the defeated. The Tairens took the prisoners into custody with little fanfare afterwards.

Sadly, Eli and his friends didn’t even have a chance to catch their breath once some soldiers began spreading word of what they’d seen and it caught the ear of one of the local gleemen. Eli and Kat had both argued that they were too conspicuous, and there was too much power on display for a group such as their own to remain free. Tomas, as always, disagreed. Being the center of a gleeman’s tale suited him just fine. Teo and Bili had sided with the other couple, however. Someone would want to claim them, Bili had argued. A free company such as theirs would soon find a rein on their muzzle and a bit in their mouths. Tomas, when it was phrased that way, came around to Eli’s way of thinking.

So they’d taken to the seas, going from port to port with Tomas and Teo’s relatives. They took small jobs with little hope of exposure when their coin ran thin. Some of those had gotten out of control, Eli admitted, though none as badly as Godan. By the time they’d reached Bandar Eban, however, even some of the smallest of their adventures had somehow become conflated with the initial tale. Even if most of their story was a fiction, his was a band of heroes in a world where too few heroes remained. People wanted to believe. Even if Godan had been a terribly mismanaged mistake of a battle. Even if they were going up against Trollocs tomorrow. Eli gulped.

Kat sat behind him and wrapped him in a tight embrace. “We’re as ready as we’re going to be. Tomorrow the dice will fall, and we’ll do what we can.”

“Somehow that doesn’t make me feel all that comfor…”

“…and if we’re lucky,” Kat interrupted, “Nataniel will blow his bloody hands off and the Trollocs will die of laughter.”

“Not helping,” Eli grumbled, doing his best not to crack a smile at the thought.

“Yes, I am,” Kat whispered as her embrace grew tighter and her breath grew warm in his ear.

“Ok, maybe a little bit of the helping.”

**Author's Note:**

> dot.Dot.DOT.


End file.
